


Our Last Summer

by PirateArrowXAB



Series: Kairi, Xion and the quiet, seaside, no-stress, fairly enjoyable day off [1]
Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Destiny Islands, Gen, adult responsibilities, lazy day, the horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-11
Updated: 2017-06-11
Packaged: 2018-11-12 19:05:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,182
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11168163
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PirateArrowXAB/pseuds/PirateArrowXAB
Summary: “People don’t go on ocean voyages with a raft and a bunch of coconuts, Xion”Kairi's had a rough few years, what with the losing her heart, and getting kidnapped, and forgetting that her best friend existed. still, she can't help but wonder if the alternative would have been any better.





	Our Last Summer

There’s coconut rind in her hair, and her grin is slow to fade as she ducks under a cresting wave. Droplets fly as she shakes her head, Xion squeaking in surprise above her. Kairi flops onto the raft, legs kicking idly as she regards the younger girl and the coconut shards that surround her. The danger seems to have passed, however, Xion regarding those same shards with an air of curiousity rather than mischief.  
“Hey, Kairi, maybe I’m not remembering right, but… Sora thought you guys were gonna live on these things for your big adventure, right? I mean, they seemed big, but there’s not really that much stuff in them, and you couldn’t really fit a lot on this raft.”  
Kairi cocks her head, good mood dimming. The ocean doesn’t feel refreshing now, just cold, and she heaves herself onto the craft beside Xion.  
“Yeah, well. It wasn’t gonna happen, anyway. It was never going to happen.”

They’d been fooling around on the island, calling impromptu races and play-fighting with their keyblades, combat drills mixed with ridiculous over-acting. Nostalgic, for Kairi, a taste of the childhood that Xion never had. The raft had been lying where they’d left it, back on that final day. Xion had grinned Sora’s infectious grin, and they’d pushed the sturdy little vessel out into the bay, stopping only to knock down some of the riper coconuts.

Now, they’re sitting on the sun-bleached timbers, waves slapping around them and clearing away the remains of their snack. They’re both drenched, and there’s little point in drying off ‘til they’re back onshore, but Kairi still wrings out her hair and shirt hem, concentrating on her tasks rather than meet Xion’s probing gaze. The other girl is a teenager in looks only, little more than two years old in reality, but Kairi’s found her to be startlingly perceptive in the time they’ve spent together. Probably something to do with having to live with a bunch of insane nobodies (and Roxas) for a year. 

“People don’t go on ocean voyages with a raft and a bunch of coconuts, Xion”,   
she mumbles, staring out at the horizon now.   
“It was just… we were kids, Ok? Kids come up with stupid plans that don’t make sense and don’t do anything about them.”  
She doesn’t even need to see her raft-mate to know she’s looking pointedly at the craft they’re on, one eyebrow probably raised.  
“Yeah, we actually made the raft, but it couldn’t happen, ok?”  
Her head snaps up, meeting Xion’s gaze, eyes inexplicably burning.  
“It was a stupid thing we did to distract us from knowing it was our last summer together!”

 

She drags her wrist across her eyes, her scowl fading as she heaves a sigh. The timbers across from her creak, and she looks up to see Xion, arms wrapped around her knees as she regards her quietly. Their silence reigns for a short while, surf crashing on cheerfully around them. 

She gives in.

“We were supposed to go searching for other worlds. Riku’s idea, yeah? He and Sora, they knew boats really well, so they knew we wouldn’t get more than a day away from the islands before we’d run low and have to turn back.”

She snorts, glances upwards.

“Their parents would’ve stopped us before we even cleared the reef, anyway.”

Xion hasn’t moved, eyes wide.

“So, why’d you build it?”

Kairi runs her hand along the bleached palm wood, frond ropes still holding strong after all this time. Not snapped, or even frayed, as she would’ve thought.

“You’ve got Sora’s memories of school, yeah?”

She waits for the hesitant nod before continuing.

“Nobody on the Islands really stays in school past 14, y’know. Me… dad probably would’ve wanted me to stay, finish high school, but he’s the mayor. If I wanted to go to one of the big island colleges, the money was there. Sora and Riku, though, they wouldn’t have come back to school in September. Riku’s dad has three boats, and Sora’s uncle had an accident a few years ago, so they would’ve been working.”

She’s looking in Xion’s direction, but she doesn’t seem to see her. Deciding not to take it personally, Xion leans forward, waiting for the older girl to continue.

“They would’ve been working”, Kairi breathes, eyes shining. “They would’ve been working, and the boats are out from dawn till night-time. I would’ve been stuck in school, getting ready for college to make Dad happy”.

The ocean is quiet around them, the surf having died down.

“We would’ve tried to meet up, gone out to the island for old time’s sake, gone to dinner at our houses, but we would’ve stopped. I would’ve left. We’d never get the chance to see each other, and then, maybe, we’d just stop making the effort.”

Her breath shudders free, and she focuses on Xion with a wobbly grin.

“We spent all that time thinking about all the worlds we were definitely gonna see, and telling our parents we had a project to finish, and just spending as much time as we could together. And then, we actually did it!

I can’t believe we got to see them.”

There’s a dark swirl of Sora’s memories, fizzling at the edge of Xion’s vision before she quells it, but not quite fast enough. Shadows flit in a roaring wind, friends disappearing along with the land below his feet. The raft, a summer’s worth of work, disintegrates, and Xion feels Sora’s sharp pang of regret, mixed with a spark of sad humor.

“Well, guess we don’t have to worry about actually doing it or not now”

Kairi startles her with a laugh, a cheerful look pasted back on her face. At Xion’s questioning look, she falls back onto the raft deck, arms outstretched as the timers rock slightly.

“I could’ve been on the mainland, stuck in some economics lecture right now. My life could’ve been normal, with no keyblades or heartless or anything!”

Water sloshes afresh as Xion lets herself slide down onto the deck, hair soaking up seawater near Kairi’s feet. She hasn’t said much since they launched the raft, picking up on something odd in Kairi’s features as soon as they’d spotted the abandoned craft. She stays silent, lets Kairi get the last of her sadness out. It’s something Axe… Lea warned her about, now that she has her own fledgling feelings. Bottling up, and all that. 

They lie in companionable silence for a while, sun slowly drying lacy salt-water patterns onto their bare arms and faces.

“Xion.”

She doesn’t look up, merely inclines her head towards Kairi. 

“You can’t ever tell Riku, but… there’s some days I’d actually thank Xehanort, for dragging us all off the Islands.”

Rustling, and the raft moves below her, Kairi grabbing a rope as she prepares to bring them back in. Xion scrambles to help, and for a moment her back is to Kairi, so she can’t see the other girl’s expression.

“I may have forgotten my best friend existed, but at least I still had a best friend to remember.”

**Author's Note:**

> Part one of a series about Kairi and Xion taking a day off for some female bonding time on the Destiny Islands. Probably won't tie in to any of my other works (which technically don't exist here yet, and are on Ffn.net til I edit them. But shhh)


End file.
